A place called Padania? The Lega Nord and the political representation of Northern Italy

In the 1990s, the debates about the resurgence of political regionalism in Europe have become particularly prevalent. One reason for this has been the fact that, in several European countries, regionalist political parties ha ve made significant electoral gains in recent years. This paper focuses upo n Italy, which is one of the countries in which there has been a significan t resurgence of regionalism over the last ten years or so. Political region alism is not a new phenomenon in Italy and there have been a number of exam ples of regionalist political parties during the history of the Italian Rep ublic. However, it is the rise to political prominence of the Northern Leag ue (Lega Nord) (LN) political party in Italian politics which has brought t o the fore questions about Italian national unity and identity. The party h as articulated a new and politically more contentious 'Northern question', which is superimposed upon the long-standing 'Southern question' in Italy. The fundamental political aim of the LN is the protection of Northern Itali an economic and cultural interests and in order to do this the party propos ed the creation of a federal Italian state, which would give greater autono my to the North of Italy. More recently, however, the party has rejected it s federalist rhetoric in favour of the hard-line discourse of secession of a place it calls 'Padania' (which roughly corresponds to Northern and Centr al Italy). The party claims to represent the whole of the 'Padanian nation' , but the geography of the party's support is not uniform across the whole of the territory. This paper explores the ways in which the LN has communic ated its main political discourses and then considers the reasons why these discourses have generated differing levels of support in three contrasting geographical contexts across Northern and Central Italy.